Legs and Co.

Jul 11, 2023 | Legs!, Sugar, Ah Honey Honey, Writing

I ran my first 10,000 meters since 2009 at the weekend, picking out a route that took me from home and around the back of Murrayfield to Roseburn and back via a roundabout route. One hour 11 minutes. It took a bit more out of me than I expected, but I know I can do it now, which helps for the next one.

I ran it alone. There are advantages in having ‘running buddies’ and there’s a kind of fun in running with a large group, but Murakami was right to say that for many of us the pleasure is in the solitude and the ‘Zen’ aspects. Having said that, I’ve signed up to do a ‘proper’ 10k in Edinburgh on October 22nd, a couple of weeks after I turn 64. I may as well mark the return to 10k form with a t-shirt and a medal. I’ve also signed up for the Edinburgh Kilomathon on Sunday 7 April 2024: 13.1 k from Ocean Terminal. Both events finish inside Murrayfield Stadium.

By the time I run both of them, they should be well within my ability given the training schedule I’m putting together, assuming no injuries or mishaps along the way – always a risk with Edinburgh’s roads and pavements.

I bought some new running shoes – last year’s model, heavily discounted when this year’s model hit the shelves – and some odds and ends of ‘technical’ clothing found very cheap in either my local Cancer Research shop or as clearance items in TK-Max. For readers in the UK, Trespass, with its never-ending sale, is quite good for heavily-discounted wicking t-shirts, as is Mountain Warehouse.

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My most recent Substack post waded into a topic that I hadn’t thought much about until a stray thought occurred while I was out running. When I started on the low-carb route I unthinkingly bought into the notion of both beer (in the sense of real ale) and bread (in the sense of traditionally baked bread) as high-carb products. What occurred to me was that looking at the carb content of the ingredients missed out on the effects of fermentation. I haven’t completely made up my mind on this, and I have to be wary of settling on the answer that I want, but I reckon there is something more going on than received wisdom suggests.

You’ll find it here: Bread and Circuses

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I’ve been writing, though not as quickly or assiduously as I’d like. I have a number of projects bubbling under and decided to prioritise putting together a sequel collection to the stories in Coyote in the Corner. The first of these, coming in at a lengthy 57,000 words, is now complete in first draft. I like it, although at present the ending is rushed and only blocked in. I’ll let it ferment for a while as I’m writing other tales in the sequence then come back and sort it out. That’s more than half the book done, though, so I’m pleased with that.

One of the things I like about Coyote is the way I managed (I think) to imply a bigger picture from how the stories fitted together. That’s my aim for this one when it is done as well.